I’ve lived a few different lives.

For a decade I served as a pastor, helping people find meaning, community, and a sense of the sacred in everyday life. But over time, I realized I was living in compartments—professional, spiritual, creative—each one meaningful but wholly disconnected from the others.

Eventually I stepped away from the pulpit in solidarity with LGBTQ+ folks and decided to build a brand consultancy, Emery Agency, where I could help companies find not just their strategy, but their soul. For the past ten years, I’ve had the privilege of guiding founders, influential artists, and global organizations toward purpose and integrity in the way they lead and create.

And yet, beneath all of it, I was still chasing wholeness.

That search became the seed for my first book, Sacred Silly: How Play Rewires Your Brain, Rebuilds Relationships, and Reclaims Your Joy. It’s a love letter to the sacredness of play—the reminder that joy and reverence are not opposites, but partners. Writing it helped me rediscover a lighter, more integrated way of being in the world.

Now, with this new dream, Kai Retreats, I’m weaving all these threads together.

• The (irreligious) pastor who loves people.

• The entrepreneur who loves systems.

• The artist who loves mystery.

Kai—which simply means “and”—is the culmination of that journey. It’s a place for people like me: those who have built good lives, maybe even impressive ones, but long to feel whole again.

These retreats are my invitation to others walking that same path of integration. To set down the armor, step away from the noise, and remember that everything—our ambition and our rest, our strength and our softness—belongs.